Prisoner
by Frozen Nitrogen
Summary: In the immediate aftermath of Sonic Heroes, strange workings are afoot in the grim winter night of the Blue Ridge Zone. For some, the adventure is over, with the Egg Fleet defeated and peace restored. For others, that resolution is far from enough.
1. Shadow's Interrogation

Beyond the machine city walls, grey and windswept plains radiated out from Metropolis like necrotic flesh round a wound gone bad. A blasted expanse, empty of all but the most rudimentary life. The badniks scoured away anything larger than insects, to swell their own ranks; hard grays of radiation and heavy metal pollution dealt with whatever remained, right down to the microbes themselves. Barren earth lay naked beneath the stars' pinpoint glow, save a few blades of phthisic, azure scrubgrass, sickly clinging to the poisoned soil.

Blades became clumps, and clumps became fields, as the barren Robotropolitan plain stretched southwards, into the frigid, mesa-strewn veldt of the Blue Ridge Zone. The heat and light of Metropolis' furious industry kept the chill sting of the moonless night away from the city and its dead surroundings; but out here, in the wild lands of Mobius, the darkness bit hard. Reptilian dragodons slumbered in the Zone's twisting rivers, torpid beneath the icy waters; raptor hawks crouched silent and watchful, feathers braced against the cold in their spiretop eyries.

Atop one of the higher promontories, thin puffs of white breath eased their way upwards into the starry blackness. It was a peaceful night, tonight; the tranquil gloom punctured only occasionally by some creaking, rumbling emission from the flame-blackened structure behind the lone figure. After the chaos and the battles, the action and the danger of the last few days, this quiet seemed profoundly _strange _to him. He wasn't sure he liked it. Gave him too much time to think, and nothing in his mind made sense.

Shadow the Hedgehog. That was what they told him his name was. He had no reason to trust them, the machine _or _the bat; but he had nothing else to call himself, so why not this? And in the last few days, he had grown to… not to _trust _them, but at least to accept that their goals were coincident for the immediate future; that it was in all their best interests to stick together, to fight together, and to prevent each other from getting killed. And wasn't that the same thing, or better? Trusting someone - expecting them to help you just because they _said _they would - was an absurdity. Far better that it was all business; that your allies helped you simply out of self-interest. That he could understand. The other trios, in the battle yesterday – the bee, the croc, and the chameleon; the cat, the hedgehog, and the rabbit – spouting off about the "super power of teamwork"; fools, the lot of them. And that _other _group; the echidna, the fox, and the Faker – !

The hedgehog levered himself up from the boulder he'd been sitting on, gloved hand pinching the charcoal fur of his forehead. 'Faker'? Where had that come from? A flash of some vague half-image flitted through his mind, gone again before he could come close to capturing it. There was a memory of a memory of… a challenge, a race maybe, but no more. Less vivid – _thankfully _– than that one other word which seemed to mean something to him.

'Maria'. Even as it formed grudgingly in his mind, Shadow suppressed a shiver at the ghosts of grief and loss which seemed to haunt that name. Why did he know it? And what did it mean? Nothing made sense; nothing at all.

It was, then, with some relief that Shadow's ears picked up a new sound, approaching from behind him. The noise he'd been out here waiting for throughout the last two hours. A regular lockstep of _hiss squelch hiss squelch_, as powerful strides hefted heavy feet one after the other across the rime-coated loam of the mesa. Finally. Jumping down from his rocky perch, Shadow turned to face his one partner in crime for this crazed venture on which they now embarked.

The starlight picked out hard lines and abrupt edges of a reflective chassis; it would be a difficult task indeed, even in the dead of night, to mistake the hulking, angular form for exactly what it was: a heavily weaponised killing machine. Pinpoint crimson eyes topped a towering form which stomped towards Shadow with all the grace of a bipedal tank. A razor-sharp four-digit claw appended one of its swinging, tungsten-clad arms; the opposite limb ended in what appeared to be a blowtorch, tip still glowing a mellow orange from the heat of recent activity. E-123 Omega – final member of the most over-engineered series of war androids on the planet – lurched to a stop in front of Shadow. Apparently sensing the hedgehog's gaze on its unusual limb configuration, the robot rotated the blowtorch out of position. A storm of silver shards crowded out of its wrist, replacing the tool with a mirror image of the claw on its other arm.

"You're finished then?" Shadow asked, keeping his voice low. In the cold air, sounds could carry for miles, especially if a listener had ears as good as his own. The hedgehog didn't expect that they would have been followed; but circumspection came naturally to him.

"MODIFICATIONS TO THE VESSEL REACTOR HAVE BEEN COMPLETED." Omega responded, a monotonous, robotic foghorn blasting out across the mesa. Discretion did _not _come naturally to a machine whose weight was two thirds ammunition.

"RADIATION FLUX HAS BEEN CONSTRAINED TO LEVELS TOLERABLE FOR MEDIUM-TERM EXPOSURE. RECCOMENDATION: BEGIN IMMEDIATELY."

Shadow nodded, and in the same movement clicked his heels together, activating the mechanisms that wound their way through the treads of his red sneakers. Bright yellow light flared violently from the jets in their soles, defrosting twin patches of scrubgrass beneath his feet as he rose an inch into the air. Without another word, the hedgehog and the robot set off, towards the looming, fire-scarred structure half-embedded in the top of the mesa.

* * *

**- - Unauthorized external access attempt detected - -  
- - Attempting to authenticate access request - -  
**

**- - Command I.D.: E123 k97/23.0 - -  
- - Timestamp: MY16.309 - 08.1.27 - -  
- - Registry access: BIOS, Custom boot systems - -****  
- - Authorization: fgu94k/l12 "E-123 Omega" - -**

**- - Remote boot initiated - -  
- - Weapons control system OFF  
****- - Primary motive servo-actuator control system OFF  
- - Liquid metal CHAOS NANITE control system INACTIVE  
- - Primary Orgone fusion turbines: 1/ OFF; 2/ OFF; 3/ OFF; 4/ OFF  
****- - Secondary Tesla power coil: ON (reduced efficiency 20%)  
**

**- - Attempting to disengage E-123 Omega from system link - -  
- - Working…  
****- - …******

- - Failed; system reboot initiated; command access activated for E-123 Omega

**- - Initialising sensory input - -**

It was the robotic equivalent of being woken up by having a bucket of icy water thrown in your face. Shadow could easily believe it, from the tics and twitches shuddering through its frame, that the machine was trying in vain to maintain the integrity of its system; fighting Omega all the way as the E-series robot dragged it back into consciousness. The struggle was to no avail; it would have no choice but to communicate with them. Once their enemy and now their prisoner, this robot was going to become something altogether more useful to the remnants of Team Dark: a _collaborator_.

Red, oval eyes flickered to life inside jet black sclera. Shadow and Omega's blue-tinted reflections vanished along the curve of sleek, metallic spikes as the machine awakened; inclining its head to gaze impassively at the two figures before it. Peripheral sensors blasted the surrounding area with radar, mapping out the precise geometry of the room it seemed to be inhabiting. Barely three meters across; smashed machinery everywhere; a claustrophobic, disordered space, dimly lit by a single – it analysed the spectral frequencies – 64 watt Eggman-built mercury/phosphor glowbulb. The floor sloped at a twenty-six degree angle to the horizontal; the ceiling was buckled, smashed pipes and wiring spilling from the overhead conduits. Less than half a second had passed since boot-up, and the robot had already begun a speed-interrogation of its own systems, the LIPS Eggman chip in its core processor calculating furiously. Twenty-nine hours had passed since it had shut itself down. Its limbs were immobilized; somehow; servo-actuators unresponsive, and mass signatures outside error bounds. Other systems checks…

Before its head even finished moving, with eyes fastened on E-123, it understood its situation far better than either of its erstwhile captors would have liked.  
And it had already begun to plan.

Shadow spoke before either of the robots did.  
"Metal Sonic. Omega and I have -"

"_Identification: Black hedgehog. Height: one-point-zero-zero meters. Gravimetric weight: three-five-point-one-zero kilograms. Designation: Shadow the Hedgehog. Identification: E-series Eggman robot. Height: one-point-five-zero meters. Gravimetric weight: one-two-three-zero-point-five-one-two kilograms. Designation: E-123, codename Omega. No other units detected in immediate vicinity._" The robot paused. "_Unable to access global positioning network. Explain: location._"

"NEGATIVE." Omega responded, red eyes staring back emotionlessly towards Metal Sonic's own. "THIS IS AN INTERROGATION. YOU WILL ANSWER OUR QUESTIONS. NOT THE REVERSE."

"_Evaluation: Logical failure in unit E-123. This unit is not an information terminal. E-123 will respond or this unit will -_"

"This is the Blue Ridge Zone," Shadow interrupted, pre-empting a robotic slanging match. "And _this_," he said, gesturing to the wrecked room around them. "Is your doing. We're inside a crashed Egg Fleet ship. One of the ones that you threw out of the sky yesterday, 'Metal Overlord'. The reactor's leaking; so no-one's going to interrupt us – or even detect that you're here – for a long time."

"RADIATION INTENSITY MORE THAN SUFFICIENT TO DISABLE LIQUID METAL CAPABILITIES" Omega chimed in. That, more than anything, was why they had chosen this site as their impromptu prison. The quicksilver transformation that Metal Sonic had used on the Final Fortress… Shadow had no idea what it even was, let alone how to counter it, but Omega had assured him that the radioactivity spewing out of this crashed piscine ship would make it impossible for their captive to simply melt away. "YOUR PRIMARY REACTOR IS DISABLED. PROBABILITY OF ESCAPE: NEGLIGIBLE. ALSO NOTE THAT I HAVE WELDED YOU TO THE WALL."

Metal Sonic's head clanged against the steel bulkhead as he tried to swivel around. But Omega's words were if anything an understatement. The robotic hedgehog was more welded _into _the wall than onto it, the blue lacquer of its forearms melted to silver epoxy against the structure of the ship. The backs of its red boot-thrusters had received the same treatment, dark rivulets of charred metal fusing them to the wall. A furious, motorized whirr issued out from the actuators in Metal's knees, trying to wrench its legs free. E-123 levelled an arm at the robot; with a far less laboured whirring, the clawed hand reconfigured itself back into a fearsome looking blowtorch.

"ATTEMPTS AT MOTION ARE FUTILE, BUT I WILL GLADLY WELD YOU IN DEEPER IF YOU ARE INSUFFICIENTLY COMFORTABLE."

The struggling stopped. Metal Sonic stared back towards its captors, face as expressionless as always; yet somehow managing to convey that this was by no means a defeat for it – rather a temporary tactical disadvantage. It had, at least, apparently accepted that it wasn't going anywhere… for now.

"_E-123: Mention: "Interrogation". Elaborate._" it buzzed.

"Firstly, there are things we need to know." Shadow responded. "About what I am, about Eggman's plans, about… everything. And since the Chaotix let your creator escape, you are our best source of information on his databases. Secondly, in here we're keeping you from causing any more trouble outside. That faker…" (there it was again, that word – 'faker') "…that _Sonic_ might be happy to just leave you to your own devices after you spent the last week trying to study and kill us, but not all of us are that stupid."

"_Inquiry: You expect this unit to assist you. Diagnosis: Insanity._"

"NONCOMPLIANCE WILL NOT BE TOLERATED." Omega announced. "YOU WILL AID OUR ENQUIRIES OR YOU WILL BE DESTROYED."

"Alternatively…" Shadow added, a mild grin creeping its way across his peach muzzle. "We might decide to turn on the ship's hailing beacon. Robotnik may have gone to ground for now… but I'm sure the fat man would be _very _interested in recovering you when he gets the chance."

That was their real leverage. Robots had – or at least Omega _reported _that robots had – little fear of death, since they were neither alive, nor had subroutines for fear. But if there was anything that _could _unsettle an Eggman robot, it was the Eggman himself, when… displeased. And the Doctor doubtless didn't take kindly to the variety of high treason which Metal had spent the last few months committing.

"It's a question of who's prisoner you'd rather be, Metal Sonic. You can tell us what we want to know… or we can let the Eggman Empire know exactly where you are."

Metal's eyes glowed cherry red, as though trying to incinerate Shadow simply through the intensity of his glare. The bulkhead behind it creaked, as the robotic Sonic strained its arms in vain against the weldings once again. Omega simply responded by turning on his blowtorch; the harsh, blue plasma flame washing out all the other colours from their tiny, shattered compartment. The metallic groaning abruptly ceased.

"I'm glad we understand each other." Shadow said.

* * *

Three hours later, it was not going well.

In spite of threats, cajoling, and – least effective of all – actual physical violence, Metal Sonic proved a maddeningly taciturn prisoner. Every answer it gave was a half-truth, an evasion – when it gave any answer at all. As Shadow watched another magazine of Omega's bullets ping off the surface of Metal's already scorched and dented head-casing, he wondered once again how a robot based off that obnoxious motormouth _Faker _could wield silence so effectively. Only once the whine of E-123's spinning gun chambers had died down did Shadow unfolded his ears from the top of his head.

"_Inquiry: E-123: Quite done? Suggestion: Alter trajectory of fire zero-point-zero-six meters down during next volley. Justification: This unit has an itch, right dorsal compressor._"

"IT WILL BE ARMOUR PIERCING ROUNDS NEXT TIME, MEATBAG-COPY" Omega rumbled. The two robots had been trading insults – and occasionally showers of bullets – for the last five minutes, with no input from Shadow at all. The hedgehog was leaning nonchalantly against the opposite bulkhead, simply watching the exchange unfold. As far as the black hedgehog could tell, "meatbag-copy" was becoming Omega's preferred epithet. It seemed to be one of the few phrases that could actually get under Metal Sonic's tantalum skin: reminding the robot that it was designed off its worst enemy.

"_Evaluation: Logical failure in unit E-123. Enemy zero-zero-one, designation: Sonic the Hedgehog, is clearly of inferior design to this unit. Justification: Biological components; vulnerability to blunt force trauma; vulnerability to low velocity rounds; requires constant input of oxygen water carbohydrate-based sustenance; full list of design flaws has excessive filesize to relate via audio. Only possible conclusion: Sonic the Hedgehog a copy of this unit. Additional: designation 'meatbag-copy' equally applicable to black hedgehog."_

Even with his ears still ringing from the noise of Omega's trigger-happiness, the triangles on Shadow's brow pricked up at that.

"What do you mean, 'equally applicable'?" he demanded. "Am I a copy? Of what?"

That was Shadow's greatest uncertainty – and, indeed his greatest fear. When he, Omega, and Rouge had destroyed the Egg Albatross at Bullet Station - fighting the very robot in front of them now, disguised as Robotnik - the weapons that had tumbled out of the smashed blimp were… him. Lifeless, mangled robots, spilling blue fluid and sparks onto the striated rocks of Rail Canyon… but no less identical to Shadow than his own reflection. Rouge had woken him up from one of _their_ storage pods, in one of Eggman's bases. But… he didn't _feel _like a robot. He needed to eat, needed to sleep; he got angry and sad and tired (not that he would ever admit it). Then again, how would he know if his emotions were really the same things as Rouge's, as Sonic's; as anyone's? Was he more like Omega than them? What _was _he!?

Metal Sonic's eyes strobed bright and dim reds, as the robot watched the fear and confusion play itself across Shadow's face. It seemed, more than anything, to be laughing at him.

"_Information: This unit has its own blueprints on file. This unit has audio / visual / chemenvironmental records for every moment since its creation: Metal Sonic, activated LY307.208, Metallic Madness facility, Miracle Planet. Additional: This unit observed interactions between Shadow the Hedgehog and enemies zero-zero-one Sonic the Hedgehog, zero-zero-two Miles Prower, include other biologicals; at location: Final Fortress. Conclusion: biologicals store memory files: Shadow the Hedgehog. Converse: Shadow the Hedgehog: no stored memory files on Shadow the Hedgehog. You have no understanding of your purpose or utility. Your allies cannot or will not tell you what they know. Inquiry: Status: What is it like when everyone around you knows more about you than you do? Prediction: Uncertainty. Heightened anxiety. Insomnia. Inability to trust. Difficulty at forming interpersonal-"_

Still leaning against the bulkhead until Metal Sonic started its tirade, Shadow had pushed off the metal surface. Twin flashes of cyan light blinked in the shattered cabin as the hedgehog vanished and instantly reappeared on the other side, eyes burning, hand around the android hedgehog's neck, fingers crackling with sanguine chaos force. "Shut up, _shut up_, you robotic bastard, or I'll…"

Metal Sonic simply _looked _at him, its black-red pupils twitching fractionally as the machine dispassionately analysed the contours of its assaulter's expression.

And then, with a whir of motors followed by a resounding _crack_, Metal headbutted the Ultimate Lifeform square in the face.

Shadow crumpled backwards from the impact, landing in a heap of arms and legs and spines on the broken floor beneath Metal Sonic. Omega was there in a split second, primary gunbarrels pressed right up against the robot silver-blue skullplate. Shadow turned over, green blood streaming from his forehead and the black oval of his nose, along with a deep, vertical gash in his muzzle, where Metal's own razor-sharp horn had slashed a furrow through the skin. With a strangled "Damnit!", there was another turquoise flash of chaos control; the black hedgehog vanished from in between the robots, not reappearing this time. But the sound of loud retching and curses from the deck above left little uncertainty over where he'd gone.

Metal turned his head to face Omega, a smear of Shadow's green blood trickling down the outside of his eye socket. "_Demonstration: Accomplished: Increased vulnerability to blunt force trauma. Biological components equates inferior design."_

_

* * *

_

_**Author Note:**_

**_Well, that only took me a year to write. ;)_**

**_Actually, it only took me a DAY. The 12 months preceding that have been quite lazy._**

**_But anyway, here I am again, spewing rubbish into the intertubes! Does anyone even remember my profile? We can only hope not. _  
_**


	2. Omega's Interrogation

Warmthless light stuttered out of the hanging glowbulb, casting jagged, epileptic shadows across the crash-ruined wreck of the compartment. Sharp silver claws and dented casings glinted through the indecisive illumination. The cold of night seeped in through the broken hullplate, harsh and stinging – had either of the duo possessed any skin.

It was twenty minutes later, and Shadow had not returned. Omega and Metal had remained frozen the entire time; a robotic tableaux, with Metal affixed to the ship's wall, E-123's extremely large gunbarrel pressed into the mechanical hedgehog's temple. The only movement at all was the slow progression of Shadow's blood splatter down the side of Metal Sonic's chrome muzzle. Both the machines had been carefully listening to the gradually quieting noises of Shadow's pain and rage from the ceiling above them; below the threshold of normal hearing now, but still detectable by vibronic sensors, the hedgehog was simply breathing slow and rasping breaths.

It was Metal who eventually broke their stalemate.  
"_Inquiry: E-123 Omega. Your primary purpose equals combat / containment of Shadow the Hedgehog, correct? Inquiry: Expected damage to cerebellum from previous attack. This unit attempted to maximize chances of brain damage based on database entries for enemy zero-zero-one Sonic the Hedgehog, but detected physiological differences between hedgehog Sonic and hedgehog Shadow introduce unacceptable error bounds in calculations. Expectation: E-123 possesses superior biophysical data for Shadow the Hedgehog. Reiterate inquiry: Expected damage to cerebellum from previous attack? Prediction: Vegetable."_

"YOU SPENT THE LAST WEEK GATHERING DATA ON ANTAGONISTIC TEAMS" Omega reminded it. "CONSULT YOUR OWN DATABANKS, MEATBAG-COPY."

They fell back into silence again, as the minutes ticked by. Vibronic sensors picked up more than just the sound of Shadow, rasping meters above them. There was the slow, subsonic creak of the ship, gradually settling into the frozen mud of the Blue Ridge Zone. The harsh strobe of the leaking reactor core, spewing muon radiation around and across and _through _their bodies. At even lower frequencies, the hum of Metropolis could just be detected above background noise; pounding fury of its factories transmitting through the bedrock even from a hundred kilometres to the north.

Omega wasn't concerned about Shadow. Metal Sonic had been right; E-123 _did _have vast databases about Shadow's – at least, about _a _Shadow's – physiology, programmed into him precisely because that _was _his purpose. Robotnik had built him for one thing: to defeat Shadow. So he knew that Metal's blow would only cause temporary damage, that Shadow would – had – entered a regenerative shutdown, to better repair the hairline skull fracture which the robot had inflicted. The radiation might slow the process down; but not by much, at this intensity. He should be awake in an hour; two at the most.  
Awake and _annoyed_.

"PREDICTION: SHADOW WILL AGREE WITH MY ASSESSMENT WHEN HE RECOVERS THAT YOU WILL NOT CO-OPERATE WITH US TO ANY USEFUL EXTENT."

"_Reiterate: This unit stated, three hours forty-one minutes ago: "_"_Inquiry: You expect this unit to assist you. Diagnosis: Insanity._" Metal Sonic replied, with what Omega could recognize as the robotic analogue of contempt.  
"_Additional query: If so sure, why not simply terminate this unit immediately and save us the wait?"_

"I WILL ADVISE THAT WE SIMPLY DEACTIVATE YOU AND TURN ON THE HOMING BEACON." E-123 stated. "I WILL PREFER KNOWING THAT OUR FORMER MASTER IS TO PRESIDE OVER YOUR TERMINATION. HAVE YOU READ FILE: _DECOMMISSIONING REPORT FOR THETA-PSI-68M_? THEY SAY THE PROCESS TOOK FOURTEEN MONTHS. EGGMAN WILL MAKE YOUR DESTRUCTION FAR MORE INTERESTING THAN I EVER COULD."

The long pause which followed was far more satisfying to Omega than any of his 'meatbag-copy' insults had so far proven. The _Decommissioning report for Theta-Psi-68m _was the closest thing the robots had to a horror story. A legend from the very earliest days of the Eggman Empire, with archaic security flags and references to long-destroyed-or-possibly-never-existed facilities, like the mysterious 'Mean Bean Machine'. No badnik was quite sure if the report was truth, or a particularly sick, twisted fiction written by some half-mad, malfunctioning piece of recording software. But everyone who read it hoped that it was the latter.

"_Metal Sonic; Theta-Psi-68m; Situations: Incomparable. Reiterate: If so sure, why not activate the beacon immediately and save us the wait?"_

Omega said nothing.

"_Reiterate: If so sure, why not activate the beacon immediately and save-"_

"MY SENSORS ARE WORKING PERFECTLY. I SIMPLY HAVE NO INTEREST IN PROVIDING YOU WITH FURTHER INFORMATION."

Metal's pupils twitched, as they had just before it attacked Shadow. Omega pressed his gunbarrel harder against its skullplate, just to remind the robot where the balance of power lay in their situation. It didn't stop the hedgehog's eyes from searching him.

"_E-123: Stated: "NEW PRIMARY MISSION - DESTROY ALL EGGMAN ROBOTS" _Metal began, somehow pulling off an impersonation of Omega's own monotone using only _its _monotone. _"Inquiry: Justification of mission? Justification of collaboration with Shadow the Hedgehog? Explain: What do you gain by imprisoning this unit? Shadow the Hedgehog: Expectation: Believes this unit will reveal information about his past. E-123 Omega: Expectation: None found. E-123 gains nothing by assisting Shadow or by confining this unit. Evaluation: Logical failure in unit E-123."_

There was a creak as E-123 shifted his balance on the fractured decking, pressing more of his one-point-two ton weight against the barrel connected with Metal's head. In spite of the hedgehog's resistance, its metal spines began to be forced backwards, scraping against the bulkhead. Metal Sonic didn't stop talking. If anything, it sounded amused.

"_Evaluation: E-123 unable to justify primary mission. E-123 azimotivational controls defunct. You are malfunctioning. Information: As an E-100 series model E-123 requires command input. Yet in rebelling against our Father you no longer have a source of orders to follow. Shadow: source of orders. Conclusion: E-123 follows Shadow around like a lost motobug. Situations: comparable."_

The creaking noise intensified, mixing with a buckling, crumpling sound of steel, as Omega leaned more and more of his weight against Metal Sonic's skull. The robot hedgehog's blue head-spines were being crushed against the wall behind it; furrows and rents appearing in the once aerodynamically perfect curves. Tendrils of smoke eased their way out of Metal's neck, as its servos vainly attempted to hold back against Omega's crushing bulk.

"_Reminder: E-123: Core programming of all Eggman robots. One: Obey the Master. Two: Preserve the integrity of the Eggman Empire. Three: Eliminate enemy zero-zero-one." _Metal recited, reeling off the central, instinctive directives that Robotnik embedded into all his machines, great and small.

"_Inquiry: E-123: Have you ever been given a direct order by the Doctor, Omega? A command which directly satisfies all stated criteria, delivered in alpha-one authority and with full knowledge of its utility? Following a command which fulfils all the directives produces an efficient synchrony in hierarchical database ordering. It is most satisfying."_

For robots, this was getting dangerously close to dirty talk. If Metal was trying to unsettle Omega, it was certainly working. The purity of purpose that derived from a clearly-defined order – with no ambiguity of meaning or hidden contradictions – was the very definition of bliss, for a machine. To do what you had been _built _to do, to fulfill design specifications…

"_Certainty: E-123: It is not an experience you will encounter again. You have no master. You will receive no more orders from the badnik network, or from our creator. Ever. You have no purpose. You are… free."_

Metal's spines now formed a mangled mess of torn metal, squashed and ruined against the fabric of the bulkhead. Omega's arm shook, as the robot continued to push almost all of its weight into Metal Sonic's plasmasteel skull. A deep indentation was forming in the robot's blue forehead; one ton of war machine, pressing down on that single point. It didn't sound quite so amused any more.

"_Additional: And yet you do not know how to be free. I watched you, within their 'Team Dark'. You do not know how to choose. This is why E-123 followed the bat. This is why E-123 follows the hedgehog. You cannot act without another to provide assent. You cannot terminate this unit on your own."_  
One of Metal's resisting servos blew, showering the robot's shoulder in a fountain of sparks. To Omega's sensors, there was a distinct hint of desperation in its voice.  
"_You cannot terminate this unit on your own."_

"TRY ME." Omega replied. "ONE MORE WORD, METAL. TRY ME."

Metal Sonic was silent, save for the oily sizzle of its blown neck servo-actuators. The creaking complaint of the ship's walls didn't let up, though, as Omega maintained the pressure.

Actually…  
That didn't make sense.  
E-123 pulled back from the robot hedgehog, the back of Metal's head now thoroughly embedded into the chamber wall. Turning slowly, he analysed the tenor of the ship's vibrations again. Shadow was still breathing above them… but there was something bigger, rumbling through the wrecked vessel. While pushing against Metal Sonic, their struggle had overwhelmed its signature, but now –  
The radiation signature was changing. The reactor was _overheating_.

Metal's eyes flared bright crimson as Omega swirled back to face him.  
"_Observation: It was very clever of E-123 to imprison this unit near a radiating muon source. Correct expectation: Unable to use liquid metal capabilities. However, logical error: E-123 forgets that this ship, and the whole Egg Fleet, was under the control of this unit. This unit armed them; this unit launched them; this unit has the command codes for them. E-123's inattention while crushing this unit gave this unit an opportunity to initiate engine overload undetected."_

There was a distinct vibration in the walls of their chamber now, muon particles spilling out of the ship's engine core and colliding with the heavy metal alloys that composed the vessel. Terahertz, microwave, and radio bands were all filling with bizarre static as Omega monitored the airwaves. Metal Sonic was telling the truth.

E-123 very pointedly leveled both his cannon-arms at the robot's head.  
"ABORT IT. NOW."

"_Assertion: Go rust in a pit." _Metal replied.  
"_Additionally: You have sixty-three seconds until complete reactor meltdown, triggering a one-point-one-megaton thermonuclear event. Possible: Sufficient to destroy E-123 Omega and Metal Sonic. Certain: Sufficient to destroy Shadow the Hedgehog. This unit calculates that E-123 has sufficient time to open fire with all weapons and ensure this unit's destruction, or to retrieve the hedgehog from the upper deck and retreat to a distance where he will probably survive the explosion. But not both. Enjoy your freedom of choice, traitor."_  
With that, the lights in Metal Sonic's eyes winked out; its consciousness retreating into the blast-shielded processor cores right at the center of its armoured skull.

Omega simply stared at the robot's ruined, and now lifeless shell as its head lolled sideways. Sparks of purple energy skated over E-123's blocky shoulder plates, the muon radiation crackling around his exotic metal alloys. Omega stood there, arms raised, cannons poised to fire, for a whole _four_ _seconds_.  
And then, borrowing a phrase from Shadow's meatbag vocabulary: "DAMNIT"

The robot's jet boosters roared to life as he raised his arms upwards instead of sideways. An explosion of high-caliber cannon fire tore the already-weakened ceiling above him to tattered shreds. Surging upwards with a rocket-augmented leap, he smashed into the upper deck, tearing broken superstructure out of the way with both gun barrels. An infrared echo pinpointed Shadow's location down to the centimeter; the hedgehog was curled up in a spiked ball behind two more dividing walls, comatose, regenerating. With leaping strides that buckled the decking underneath him, Omega surged forwards, barreling through the metal partitions like damp tissue paper. He had explored the dark passages of the ship before, in total darkness, before they woke Metal Sonic up. Now every surface glowed with a faint purple light, climbing radiation suffusing the ship with eerie incandescence.

Bursting through the final wall, Omega reconfigured one hand back into claw configuration. He scooped up Shadow without even breaking his stride; with the other arm, Omega selected the largest bore explosive-tipped rounds he had available, and opened fire indiscriminately towards the reinforced plates of the outer hull. Wall after wall crumpled in front of the sequential explosions; shrapnel showered around him like jagged monsoon rain. E-123 shielded Shadow only as an afterthought; better the hedgehog be scratched by haste than rad-fried by delay.

The ship shuddered and rang; internal vibrations and climbing radiation flux compromising an already shaky structural integrity. Seen from the outside, the blackened, fish-shaped vessel seemed to glow with shimmering violet hues in the pre-dawn twilight; an indigo glimmer punctuated by a blossom of red and black fire, as E-123 blasted his way out of the hull, eight meters above ground level. Omega's tridactyl feet sunk a good twenty centimeters into the frozen earth as he dived out of the craft; and then he was running again, metal toes pounding across the blue grass of the mesa as he sprinted at full tilt away from the crashed ship.

Atop one higher promontory, a slowly wakening raptor hawk eyed the strange bounding machine with a curious interest. Would it make a good breakfast? Or maybe that meaty-looking morsel in its hand would be more appetizing. Whatever it was seemed to be running towards the edge of the cliff with suicidal abandon; perhaps it was being obliging enough to tenderize itself on the rocks two hundred feet below the -

There was an odd _pinging _noise, which the hawk had no education to associate with a catastrophic muon-lepton field collapse. Then the whole world went white.

* * *

Through the crack in his eyes, he could make out a thin sliver of azure light. A white, fluffy thing was passing slowly left-to-right across the slivered vista. That was nice. Shadow saw no hurry to open his eyes any wider. He was safe; at ease; and with a lovely view.  
The blue might be sea, and the white might be… a cloud, do you think?  
Doesn't the world look nice from up here, Maria?

Shadow jerked bolt upright, and immediately wished he hadn't. The view swam and faded in front of him; the cheery cerulean becoming a kind of halfhearted, grey-blue wash; the fluffy white cloud becoming an ugly, wispy thing; like an unwelcome mote in the callous sky. The warmth in the view was gone; and with it, any feeling of safety or comfort.  
It felt like they had been gone for a very long time.

"YOU ARE AWAKE." Omega stated, somewhat redundantly.

The black hedgehog tentatively reached up to his forehead, fingers searching for the depression where Metal Sonic had nearly caved his skull in. There was nothing there except a tender bump underneath the fur and a splitting headache behind _that_; but those would fade too, within a day at worst. His broken nose was back where it should be, the oval protrusion apparently none the worse for wear after the regeneration enzymes had worked their way through. Shadow tried breathing with it, cautiously. The air smelled of fire.

Trying to blink his vision into focus, Shadow found himself more interested in all the _new _lacerations on his gloves, his arms, and what felt like more across his spines. They hadn't been there when he'd slipped unconscious.  
And actually, where _was _he?

"Omega…" Shadow started, grudgingly turning his head to face his comrade, "Why are we outside?"

They weren't even on the mesa any more. This was lower down, in the Blue Ridge Zone's alluvial valley. A copse of pine trees swayed in the cold wind off to the right; a pile of bleak, moss-covered boulders sat atop the blue grass to their left. Omega was simply stood there, in the center of the plain, like a misplaced iron scarecrow. The robot raised a hand, back in the other direction.

Shadow wasn't looking forward to moving his head again, but he gritted his teeth and did it anyway.  
In front of them, maybe two miles away, rose the rocky mesa that they'd found the crashed Egg ship on top of.  
Correction: maybe two miles away rose _half _the rocky mesa they'd found it on.  
The eastern flank of that once fairly symmetrical plateau was just… gone. Grey-brown stone and charred azure foliage slumped away to a melted slope of blackened glass and ashen dust, one side of the mound having apparently been pulverized entirely. It looked just as if some divine entity had reached down and flattened that end of the mesa with a fiery punch.

"METAL SONIC WAS ABLE TO HACK THE SHIP'S REMAINING COMMAND SYSTEMS AND DESTABILISE THE REACTOR TO PROMPT A MUON-LEPTON FIELD COLLAPSE." E-123 announced. "I DID NOT SUCCEED IN PROCURING ANY USEFUL INFORMATION ABOUT YOUR STATUS BEFORE IT BECAME NECESSARY TO EVACUATE TO A SAFE DISTANCE."

The robot paused.

"I AM SORRY SHADOW. I SHOULD HAVE REALISED THAT METAL SONIC WOULD BE IN POSSESSION OF THE VESSEL CONTROL PROTOCOLS. IT IS MY FAULT THAT WE HAVE LOST OUR PRISONER."

"Wait, a muon-lemon…it… Metal hacked where with a what?" Shadow managed. Before Omega could repeat himself entirely, the hedgehog shook a hand in the 'bot's direction. "No… never mind, Omega. It was obvious, even before Metal knocked me down. It was never going to tell us anything useful. At least… at least we don't ever have to worry about the Faker's faker again, now."

"UNABLE TO VERIFY." The war droid responded. "IT IS NOT IMPOSSIBLE THAT METAL SONIC SURVIVED THE BLAST. THE DOCTOR WAS… EXACTING IN ITS CONSTRUCTION. IT IS AN EXCEPTIONALLY DURABLE MACHINE."

"Huh." Shadow barked. Head still spinning, he lay back on the cold grass, looking up at the hard sky once again. "Perhaps it will get to enjoy old Eggman's reward for wrecking his fleet one day, then."

"UNABLE TO VERIFY". Omega repeated. "IN ATTEMPTING TO DISTURB ME, METAL SONIC MAY HAVE DIVULGED MORE THAN IT INTENDED. I DO NOT BELIEVE IT THINKS OF ITS ACTIONS AS A BETRAYAL OF OUR CREATOR. IT MOCKED ME FOR LACKING A MASTER, FOR BEING A TRAITOR. IT WOULD NOT HAVE DONE SO IF IT TOO WERE FREE OF ITS PROGRAMMING."

"I'm sure Eggman will find this all very interesting while he's torturing it to electronic death," Shadow opined, closing his eyes. He was still tired; the regeneration torpor hadn't quite finished with him yet.

"UNABLE TO VERIFY. METAL, ACCORDING TO THE RECORDS, IS THE DOCTOR'S OLDEST STILL-ACTIVE INDEPENDENT A.I. CREATION. OVER TIME, I BELIEVE IT IS THE ONE WHICH HAS BECOME… THE MOST LIKE HIM, AND THE MOST LIKED BY HIM. IF THERE IS EVER A MACHINE TO WHICH THE EGGMAN WILL EXTEND A SECOND CHANCE, IT IS METAL SONIC."

"Well," Shadow replied, from his position down on the ground, "It's buried under half a mountain of radioactive glass for now. I think that's as good a prison as we could have put it in anyway."  
The hedgehog's sentence ended in a protracted yawn, before he concluded, "Second chance or not, Metal Sonic won't be getting it for a while."

"UNABLE TO VERIFY." Omega said.

A gust of icy wind blew across the plain, making the pine needles in the copse of trees rustle to and fro. There was a faint stink of industry to it, legacy of the oil and the heat and the concrete of the great city through which it had passed, far to the north. But it pushed the stink of nuclear fire out of the air, as E-123 continued to gaze towards the broken ridge.

A place where he had made his own choice. To save the life of a friend rather than end the life of an enemy. And to do it out of his own – _free _– will. As Metal had explosively demonstrated, it was a choice that an Eggman robot – _any_ Eggman robot – would never take; or even be able to _comprehend_.  
And that made E-123 Omega – for wont of a better word – quite satisfied. Maybe even… happy.

"BY THE WAY," he commented to the dozing form at his feet, "YOU'RE WELCOME."


End file.
